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Thursday, November 26, 2015

The shower in our bath is leaking from the taps. Mr Tabubil went to see how bad the leak was. He didn't stop to check which direction the shower head was pointing before he turned the taps on. Mr Tabubil is wet.

Monday, November 23, 2015

At
the end of October we invited a few friends around for a light spot of
Halloween cheer. We even had a theme - worst nightmares in food and
dress.
Unfortunately for us, my "agoraphobia" costume suffered a fatal
structural failure half an hour before the party started (the damned
pigeon fell off my head), and on a warm October night, Mr
"Arachnophobia" Tabubil flatly refused to wear 6 inches of fiberfill around his chest.
To show willing, he hot glued a few wads of stuffing and a couple of
spiders to and old t-shirt. He looked a nightmare all right - a
nightmare of last-minute design, and he lost his temper along with his
stuffing.
That's sort of how the evening went. Our friend Sal - rather a man's
man - had found the food something of a stretch. He's not a natural
cook, so I set him a simple quiche - eggs, cheese and icky food coloring
in a pre-made bought pastry shell. Half an hour before the party
(right when I was wrestling pigeons) he called from the supermarket in a
panic - the recipe had been in imperial measurements and he'd converted
everything to grams to eight decimal places, but he was having trouble
figuring out what sort of eggs he should buy - vitamin fortified? Omega 3? Grade AA? Grade A? Did he need to buy a baking dish?
He arrived at the party 45 minutes late, looking cross and flustered.
He handed me a bag of chips and a jar of salsa.
"The whole afternoon's been a horror show." He said sourly. "I hate
supermarkets. Why didn't you tell me that a quiche has too cook for an
hour? Believe me, the chips count."*

*Speaking of horror shows,
you wouldn't believe what a little pulverized walnut does to the look
of guacamole. It's unspeakable. Five stars and two hearty thumbs up. I
recommend it for all your holiday parties.

And then there was the dessert. Mr Tabubil and I own a recipe for chocolate mousse. I may have mentioned it once or twice before, in passing. To do it right, you soak raisins in rum for an entire week beforehand and you use rather a lot of heavy cream - A triple batch of it makes a rather nice bowl of popo de elephante
(elephant poop.): a voluptuous tureen of turds, studded with oozing
alcoholic raisins, the heavy smell of rum rising up like drunken heat in
summer* from the swirl of well-set soup -

*I might have used
two full cups of rum in the raisins, and I might have tipped what was
left in the bottle into the bowl as I stirred. Waste is a terrible
thing.

After a couple of hours staring at the guacamole, our
guests ate lots of it. With a pleasantly buzzy fruit drink on the side.
The blood-red ice hand floating in the punch bowl was a nifty touch.
They giggled. And drank some more. And ate a second helpings of the
mousse - Not to put too fine a point on it, a lot of our guests got pished.
One young lady had three glasses before we caught
her. She giggled, climbed carefully onto the sofa and closed her eyes
- right next to Sal - who is Bermudan and treats his relationship with
rum like a religion, but who was lying with his head on the back of his
chair and his feet up on hers, sort of snoring, and cradling his third
bowl of elephant poop.

Post-script:We really had
radically overestimated how much mousse we'd need for a party of 12, and
the next morning we still had a couple of liters of the stuff. We gave it to our neighbors. They brought the bowl back the very next day - licked clean. Looking at us sort of anxiously, "That was the best dessert" they said "that we have ever had in our lives - would you like a plant?" And they thrust a potted fern at our chests.

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

In the wake of the terrible events in Paris, many voices saying words that have become all too predictable. The responsibility - in varying degrees of more or less - is placed on Europe's refugees. The trouble comes with them. We must be vigilant, we must we must resist these threats against our way of life -

I am reminded of a question that was recently posed to Germany's Chancellor Merkel:“You’re doing a lot to help the refugees,” a woman asked. “What are you doing to protect our Christian values?” Over the last few months I have found myself meditating upon an answer that was given to this question by a thoughtful and considering man: "It is a strange notion that “doing a lot to help the refugees” is distinct from the business, the practice, or the essence of Christianity. Helping refugees, feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, aiding widows and orphans in their distress - These corporal and spiritual works of mercy and justice are not a nice little additional thing that it’s generally commendable to dabble in a bit…Without them, our 'Christian values" are devoid of content and substance, an ornate treasure chest with nothing inside.We can imagine this same woman standing to ask this same question at the end of Jesus’ parable of the sheep and the goats in Matthew’s Gospel: When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. Then the king will say to those at his right hand, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” Then the just will answer him, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?” And the king will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” Then he will say to those at his left hand, “You that are accursed, depart from …” And they will interrupt, saying, “Lord, you’re doing a lot to help the refugees, but what are you doing to protect our Christian values?”

These "Christian values" are not unique. In many words and many turns of phrase, they are the foundation stones of every single culture and society on this earth. Look at the people of Paris right now - bringing strangers off the streets and into their homes to keep them safe. Restaurants are closing their shutters and turning off the lights with their patrons safe and silent inside. For those who prefer particulars - I particularly recommend Mr. Bathily, who in January hid hostages in the freezer of his shop at a very real risk to his own life.Alongside him, I recommend the Greek fishermen whose economy might be in ruins, but instead of looking for scapegoats, go out every night to make sure strangers safely reach shore - Split those hairs if you dare!

My grandparents were refugees: Poles who fought the Germans, then fled the Russians, and at the end of the second world war, made their way to Australia. Australia let my grandparents in. In due course they had children, and later, grandchildren - doctors, microbiologists, painters, writers, teachers, architects, zoo-keepers, civil servants, network administrators, surveyors, businesswomen - Now there are great-grandchildren as well; boys and girls who act in plays and build model engines and help fold the laundry and carry groceries and laugh and speak kindly in the streets - Is Australia sorry? Are we regretted? Regrettable? Can you imagine that we are not loved as we love in our turn?

It is not a good time for the vulnerable anywhere in the world right now. For myself, I can only speak for the Christian culture of Western Europe, but I will say this: Over the next few weeks, much of Western Europe will celebrate a cultural origin story - a story of the greatest love the earliest Christians could conceive. How wonderful it would be if, instead of celebrating by rote and having the parties and singing the songs and paying postage on cards promising goodwill and fellowship and reflecting warmly on a season well done, we could think seriously about the values that we are celebrating? We are imperfect. We stumble. We fall. But always, and often at the same time, we rise up. Black balaclavas and guns are as much of a threat that we permit to be. We are compassionate. We are kind. We possess mercy and charity and love - love for the citizens of Paris, and love for the thousands and thousands of people just like ourselves, who are right now fleeing horrors that black balaclavas have devised and placing themselves into the hands of strangers, hoping for charity in the names of our shared values and humanity. These are frightening times. Reaching beyond our fears take strength and courage that are often difficult to find. To those voices anxious for their cultural values - I ask you to let your pride in those values raise you up. If you are afraid, let those who are not carry you until your strength returns. In honor and love, out of culture and humanity, we cannot do less. Any day of our lives.

Monday, November 9, 2015

We were woken by a temblor at 4:45 on Saturday morning.Mr Tabubil shook me awake - "big one, big one, Get UP!""Whuuhhh?"BANG! The room shuddered. BAMMOBAMMOBAMMO - And we were up, half-asleep, my feet tangling in the sheets and I fell, and then we were securely next to the core and Mr Tabubil opened the front door - "Mr Tabubil! I'm not wearing pants!""Does it matter?!"BAM! BANGBAMBANG - the rattling was tremendous - walls and floors and windows and drawers and cupboard doors going bang bang bang and something in the stairwell slam slam slamming against the walls -And it eased and i saw the coats next to the door and thought "well that's all right, I can wrap one around my legs -" andBAMM! BAMMOBAMMOBAMMO-"And it stopped.It was a 6.8, near Ovalle. A very very rattly 6.8. It took us a long time to get back to sleep. Mr Tabubil was woken up again at 7:00 by a nice solid shaking 6.0 and thought "it's smaller than the last one. I don't care." And rolled over and went back to sleep. I didn't wake up at all.And that was that. We haven't heard a word about it. From anyone. This is the thing that i find most fascinating about living here in Chile, on the edge of the pacific rim. In most of the rest of the world a 6.8 is a respectable quake. Newsworthy. Water-cooler excitement for weeks.Here, once people were back to sleep, no-one raised an eyebrow. Not on facebook, not between friends or neighbors or colleagues - Nothing fell over and it's business as usual. Bothered? Us?

About Me

I am an Australian architect, married to a Canadian who followed me home.
In September 2011 we relocated from rural South Australia to the bustling metropolis of Santiago, Chile, where it's warmer than Canada, but less insect-y than Australia.
How's that for a compromise?